What I Want
by RaeLynn Skye
Summary: When an unexpected encounter brings on memories of her past, Kitty doesn't know who to turn to. But luckily, someone's already waiting...(completed)
1. Chapter One

Notes: Welcome back to "What I Want".sorry for the delay everyone.I had problems. I can't say this'll come out every day.every other day maybe. Please enjoy.  
  
What I want.  
  
"No." She said as she closed her eyes, willing her body to stop betraying her.  
  
"Non? Ma chere." He coaxed.  
  
"I said NO!" She said, trying to push him off of her.  
  
"Then why did you come back here with me if you mean no?" He asked her.  
  
"I live here too you bastard. You're the one who presumed that-because I came home in the same cab-we would be taking this to your room. You're the one who followed me to my room, who took what I was giving as a goodnight kiss to the next level."  
  
"Your body's saying 'let's go.'" He said, acting as if all he had to do was convince her that her body wanted it. Then he smiled cockily as he trailed his light, thief's fingers over the sides of her breasts.  
  
"And my heart is saying 'no.'" She said. "I'm saying no. It's what I want. My body'll respond to anyone. But *I* don't want you." She closed her eyes again, praying that he wouldn't do that thing with his mouth on her ear. "Damnit!" She said as he skimmed his tongue down the side of her ear and then concentrated on sucking on her earlobe.  
  
"See chere, you do want me."  
  
"No, you Connard." She said, thinking 'that's French, you should know what it means.' "I told you. *I* don't want you. My body wants you. I don't want you."  
  
"And it's your body I'll be taking." He said, attempting to unbutton her top.  
  
"This is rape." She said tersely. "I'll turn you in to the professor, to the police, to anyone I can think of to turn you in to."  
  
He took back his hand when she said this. His mind reeling from what she had said. He thought she was playing, at least a little bit. He thought she had wanted it. But he had been wrong, hadn't he? "I'm sorry." He said, pulling his body off of her. She'd seemed so willing, so much like she wanted it, her body was limp and soft in his hands, and he had never encountered a woman who was in that state who didn't want him.  
  
"Get out." She said, pointing to the door, a tinge of remorse, but no anger in her voice. He hoped she understood that this had never happened to him before.  
  
"Chere." He said, a question in his voice as he turned back to the almost closed door. She halted before closing it, and listened as he began speaking again. "I really am sorry. This has never happened to me before. If I'd have thought you meant it, I'd have left."  
  
"I understand." She said, her face hidden. Had he been able to see it, he would have seen the first of many tears slipping past her defenses.  
  
"Bonsoir, then." He said, turning and walking away.  
  
"Bonsoir." She said softly as she closed the door. She turned and looked at her bed. She couldn't sleep there tonight. Or any night anytime soon, unless she washed all the sweat and arousal away from the covers. But first, her body.  
  
She walked into the bathroom, and turned the water onto the farthest edge of the hot tap. And then, she let her tears come.  
  
TBC  
  
Please review. 


	2. Chapter Two

What I Want, Chapter Two.  
  
Sitting on the toilet seat, she let her eyes flush themselves of his smoke and his sweat until steam permeated the air and made her skin sticky. She turned off all but the dimmest lights, not wanting to see the damage she had let him inflict on her. He'd bruised her, she was sure of it. She bruised easily, visibly. That's what she paid for having pale skin.  
  
She reached into the shower and turned the water down from scalding. She pulled down a towel and ran her fingers through her hair. Then she took off her clothes and stepped into the warm water.  
  
All she wanted was to be clean of him.  
  
She hummed a little tune as she tipped her head back into the stream of water, letting the water run over her face, her lips.  
  
He had kissed her. Tongue in mouth, lips on lips. He had tasted like smoke and cinnamon. She hadn't wanted him to kiss her. She hadn't wanted that at all.  
  
Her face was set to a grimace as she took out her bodywash and wondered exactly what she had meant when she told Remy: "It's what I want."  
  
"What I want." She said, flooding her voice with feeling. "Damnit all to hell if I don't know what I want." But she knew that she didn't.  
  
She thought for a moment about who she wanted, but quickly tossed it away. With two telepaths in the house, and one of them dating the man she wanted, it wasn't safe to let herself think that kind of thoughts, even if neither of them was currently there.  
  
But she couldn't help imagining him running his hands up and down her sides. She couldn't help recalling the week before when he had come upon her on the roof, standing on the balustrade and leaning out, trying to make her voice carry as far as it possibly could. When he had grabbed her and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her to him as if she was his last lifeline and-almost inaudibly-whispering: "Don't you ever do that again. Ever." And then vanishing almost as quickly as he had appeared.  
  
She couldn't help but wonder if he was attracted to her. She couldn't help but wonder if he liked her any more than was expected of him. And she couldn't help but stop herself from wondering for long. After all, she knew it was just a dumb fantasy. Childish and naïve.  
  
Satisfied with her state of cleanliness, she began to rinse the soap from her body, her eyes drooping slowly closed as the hot water ensnared her senses into a lulling, sleepy compliancy.  
  
Her mind was screaming at her body to wake up, not to wander outside and fall onto her bed. The bed that smelled like French cigarettes and sweaty arousal.  
  
Eventually her body complied. She opened the window and put the fan on, trying to get his scent out of the room, bundled up her sheets, pulled on a nightgown and briskly walked out of the room. 


	3. Chapter Three

What I Want, Chapter Three.  
  
He'd been having dreams about her for a while. It was not a new thing. But these dreams would not do. This wasn't the first time he'd had an erotic dream about her, but it was the first time he'd woken up panting her name.  
  
And it wouldn't do.  
  
It was a damn good thing that Jean was at the conference, a damn good thing she'd been at the conference for almost a week too. Especially when he had seen the girl on the roof and been so terrified that she was going to jump. He couldn't *do* things like that when he was with Jean. He couldn't.  
  
He knew he had to break it off, but he really didn't know how.  
  
He'd pulled on his jeans, zipped them up, slipped his sunglasses on, and walked out of his room.  
  
And now he was wandering down the halls, wondering why he was wandering down the halls. God, he couldn't go on like this, he didn't want to be with Jean anymore. Sure, at one point he had wanted to more than life, but no longer. He had grown out of their love. It had been a possessive love, a love where he knew what he wanted with her, and took definite, planned, steps to get there.  
  
He'd asked her to marry him the day he'd turned twenty. That was when he'd felt that he was old enough for her, and she'd have likely agreed, had they talked about it beforehand. She'd accepted, though they'd never set a date. He doubted that they ever would.  
  
They grown apart. He'd thought he was mature, grown, at twenty, and he was wrong. He was more wrong than he'd ever been. He'd still been wild, reckless, and by getting engaged, caged off that portion of himself.  
  
But he didn't want it to be caged anymore. He wanted to be wild and reckless and free again. He wanted to be uninhibited in lovemaking, not mechanical-as he had been for so long with Jean. He wanted someone to love him just as much as he did her. Which he had with Jean, he was sure, but neither of them loved enough.  
  
That was the problem, neither of them loved enough. There had been passion in the beginning, unmatched passion, but it had ended as quickly as it had begun. And now they had practically nothing.  
  
He wanted something. Anything. And maybe that made him a selfish, heartless bastard, but maybe he was.  
  
Mostly he wanted her. He let her name slide off his lips as he leant up against the wall. He didn't know what that made him, a cradle-robber, he felt like one, though she was almost twenty-she had skipped a good portion of her schooling while on the run-he was twenty five. Five years wasn't all that much. But she was his student, and it was taboo to even think about a student that way. But he did. He couldn't stop.  
  
He had been walking, not realizing he was walking, but doing so nonetheless, and he found himself in the basement, at the laundry room.  
  
Why the hell had he gone to the laundry room? He wondered. But having never been one to question fate, he walked in.  
  
Only to encounter her. Practically naked, sitting on a dryer and singing.  
  
God. Was his only thought. And as her head whipped around towards him, he realized that he must have said it aloud. Her eyes were clouded with confusion as they focused, and she realized that it was him. The one she'd been dreaming about for so long. 


	4. Chapter Four

What I Want, Chapter Four.  
  
She had heard him before he'd come in. She had known he was there, she always knew when he was there. But he hadn't known she was. As much was evident by his wide eyes as he saw her, and the involuntary shudder that had run through his body as he tried to get it under control.  
  
"Kitty." He said, gaining control of his nerves and his body. "What are you doing up so late?"  
  
She looked away from him and shrugged. "I spilled something on my bed, I wanted to wash my sheets before I went to sleep." He knew that she was lying, her voice gave it away, but-though he was curious-it was her business. "Why are you up so late?" She countered, trying to lead the subject away from herself.  
  
"Couldn't sleep." He said, looking around.  
  
"Why?" She asked.  
  
He was hardly going to tell her that he'd been having explicitly erotic dreams, involving dressing her up like a sundae for him to eat. "Dreams." He said, trying to keep the lust out of his voice.  
  
It seemed as if the conversation was over, but he couldn't make his feet move. So he just stood there, looking at her, skimming his eyes over her bare shoulders, her chest. He looked up at her face, glad she'd gone back to daydreaming and left him to examine her beautiful body. He couldn't stop himself, as much as his mind told him to. He'd never seen her wearing so little, even in the sweltering hot of the summer.  
  
He had been studying her face, sadder than normal, but his eyes kept slipping downward, to her neck, her shoulders, her arms, her cleavage.  
  
Then he noticed the bruises. Dark bruises marring her perfect, pale skin. "What happened?" He asked suddenly.  
  
"What do you mean?" She replied, shaking herself from a sumptuous daydream in which he was currently seducing her.  
  
"You've got bruises." He said, taking a couple steps toward her. "Here." He skimmed his finger lightly across the crests of her breasts, astonishing her with their coldness. "And here." He scattered his fingers along the sides of her arms. As he did so, she looked away from him. "Kitty, what happened?"  
  
"Nothing." She said, praying that he wouldn't make her tell him-the object of her eternal affections-that she had practically slept with another man.  
  
"Kitty, you're hurt. I want you to tell me why." His fingers were trailing mindlessly across her skin, his mind being occupied elsewhere.  
  
Every touch was like a dagger of mixed pleasures to her sensitive skin. His cool touch soothed her bruises, and yet ignited fires in her skin that scorched through her veins. She couldn't speak.  
  
"Kitty." He said, tilting her head upwards so that she was looking at him, his voice pleading that she just tell him. She relished in the touches that he gave her, no matter that she knew that they were only the caring touches of a concerned teacher. She almost sighed as he looked into her eyes. They were filled with concern, and deep down there was a boiling anger that she knew was for whoever had done this to her.  
  
She hardly knew how to begin. She didn't want him to think she was a doing it for romance. That could tear him away from her-if he did, in fact, have any feelings for her in the first place. She could hardly get the words out as she began to think about it. "I was on a date." She paused, knowing that she'd never thought of it as a date, not really, more of an outing. "Well, I guess he thought it was a date. I just wanted to get out for a while." She paused again, breathing in and out, slowly, trying to gather her thoughts. Then she began retelling the events of the evening. Dinner, dancing, talking. And as she got into her room, what happened, she blanched. "I'm sorry, you don't want to hear all the gory details." Her eyes filled up with tears as she waited for him to lift his hands away from her tainted skin, for him to step away.  
  
But he didn't. It lifted her heart that he didn't. Her tears began to fall as he gathered her to him. "Shhhh." He said. "Tell me...let it all out, let it all go."  
  
"I couldn't make him stop." She said, not wanting to tell him why, knowing that she had to. "I couldn't control my body. I *wanted* him to stop, but I didn't." Her voice got clogged, sad, and yet filled with anger. "And I kept telling him to stop, but he wouldn't, he didn't listen to me." She paused, trying to gather the breath to speak again, thinking about it, just think about how he had violated her body, how he had violated her ignited a flame of rage in her. "I told him I would tell you, tell Professor Xavier, if he didn't stop. And then he did. He just stopped, and left." She buried her face into his chest, savoring the last moments of contact that she would share with him. Then she spoke what she had been thinking all along: "You hate me now, don't you?"  
  
"Why would you think that?" He asked her, the outrage barely seeping into his voice. She burrowed deeper into his chest. "Kitty, look at me." He said. Her eyes shot up, looking straight into his. "*Why* would you think that?"  
  
"Jillian..." Kitty mumbled, her eyes glazing over as she looked away from him.  
  
Then she began to tell the story. 


	5. Chapter Five

What I Want, Chapter Five.  
  
"About a month after I ran away I met a girl named Jillian. We met at a mall, and we got to be friends fast. After I told her that I had ran away, she helped me out. She gave me food, let me stay over on cold nights. She was the only reason that I didn't become a prostitute."  
  
Kitty paused, bringing back a picture of the girl into her mind. "She was younger than me, but so much older, like she had gone through more than anyone ever should. And she probably only helped me out because she knew that one day she'd be in the same situation as I was, and she'd want some karmic payback or something."  
  
She sighed, remembering. "About two years after I met her, I got a job, I didn't need her help so much anymore. I was still living on the streets most of the time-no one would rent a room to a seventeen year old-but even though we mainly lost contact, on those long winter nights, I would show up on her back porch, shivering and blue. And she'd let me in." She wiped the tears away from her eyes before continuing.  
  
"There had been something wrong, somehow, from the beginning. But she acted like her life was getting better, as if whatever problems she had had were going away." She shrugged and closed her eyes briefly and then laughed bitterly. "That's why it was such a complete surprise to me when she came to see me one warm, still night in the summer. She was bloody, raw, her eyes were bloodshot and bruised, and she could hardly stand up straight.  
  
"I got a room, which was always easier to do in the summer, and I took her there, tried to help her clean herself up, tried to get her to tell me what had happened. But she wouldn't." Her eyes were glazed over by now, and Scott could tell that she didn't remember that he was there, she was just letting it go. He wanted desperately to reach out and touch her, to tell her that it was ok, that she didn't have to tell him if it hurt. And he knew it hurt, because she was beginning to claw the insides of her arms.  
  
"She managed to shower without hurting herself, then I lent her a nightgown, and she fell dead asleep. But I couldn't." She closed her eyes again, envisioning the night, the bright lights of the city outside the closed drapes, the hotel room. "I just couldn't let myself fall asleep when I knew that she would need me sometime in the night. She had always been there for me, and I knew I couldn't be any less for her, so I stayed awake.  
  
"Around midnight, she woke up, screaming. The bruises on her cheeks were coated with pus and tearstains, and I went over to hold her. Just to calm her, to make sure that she would be all right. But she wasn't, and I knew that the moment I heard her." She paused. It was all coming in a flow now. The noises, the night, everything.  
  
"She was whispering, whimpering, she kept saying it, over and over: 'My fault.' After a while, I shook her, trying to get her out of the dream. She began to talk more: 'It's all your fault, you little slut. Your fault. Women are supposed to be strong, men aren't supposed to control themselves, God made it that way. He's a good christian man, damnit.if you hadn't tempted him. Beat satan out of you.' And on, and on. When she finally woke up.it was bad.  
  
"When she was ready to talk, it wasn't pretty. The first thing she said was: 'He raped me.' Her stepfather had raped her, almost every week from the time he and her mother got married until a week before. Her mother knew, or at least Jill thought her mother knew, but she didn't do anything. She was eleven when it started, and it had been going on for five years." Kitty continued to talk, to let it all out. She eventually sat down again on top of the dryer, which had long since stopped whirring, and was now buzzing away annoyingly.  
  
Jillian's mother had beaten her, whipped her, her stepfather joining in to pound his fists into her tender abdomen. Eventually they told her to leave, to go, and never come back.  
  
"And she did. She came to me, knowing that I owed her, that I would help her. I took her to the hospital.I told them that her mother and stepfather had beaten her. That he had raped her, and then beaten her to the bloody pulp that she was. And they brought them in, and they were just so cold, they admitted it, acting as if it was their duty to beat the devil out of her, as if her stepfather shouldn't even have tried to resist his pedophiliac tendencies." She paused, her voice having choked up almost beyond recognition by this point.  
  
"Jillian died two days after she came to me from uncontrollable internal bleeding. Her parents were never charged with anything." She paused, looking altogether torn apart. "About a month after that, you found me, and I came here. I probably wouldn't have survived if you hadn't found me."  
  
She remembered how he had found her. Staring down at the blood dripping off of her wrists, watching it pool on the dirt beneath her. The dirt and the blood seeping together to form a twisted, sickening mud. She'd just been waiting, waiting for her blood to stop flowing so that she wouldn't have to face the nightmares of rape anymore. The thoughts that she'd always be alone, that no one would ever care about her ever again, because of what he had done to her.  
  
"He raped me." She said, the words coming out before she could stop them.  
  
"I thought you said he stopped." Scott said, thinking she was talking about her date.  
  
"No." She said coldly. "He raped me." She paused, her eyes dilating as she flopped to the ground. "I had been going to the police station for about two weeks, I'd been trying to get charges put on them, but the police said that there was no evidence. No evidence." Her voice changed, got colder, deeper, as if she was possessed. "As if her dead body wasn't enough." A cold, almost evil laugh slipped out of her lips. "I walked out of the station, the same way I always walked, and he pulled me into the alley." Her eyes widened, full of fear and hostility. The look in them scared Scott. Her pupils flared and she continued. "He undressed me, and tied me to the fire escape, my wrists tied together, my legs twisted around the sides of the ladder. Then he took his belt off, and started whipping me with it. He kept saying that I shouldn't have helped her, that she was just a slut, that it was her fault. That it was my fault that this was happening to me. It felt like he was trying to convince himself.  
  
"After a while, I guess he got bored." Her eyes widened in terror as she curled up and pressed her back against the washing machine. "He took off his pants." She didn't want to remember the act, she didn't want to remember the ripping, searing pain that she felt as he tore through her. She closed her eyes, defending herself against the memory. "Then he raped me. When he was finished, he untied me, and just left me there. It was a long time before I could move.  
  
"When I could finally move, I went and bought the blades. Then I went to the park, and I just did it. I cut, and cut, and cut, and cut, and cut, until I was so weak I couldn't anymore. And then you found me." Her arms were around her knees, and she was rocking herself. "I wouldn't have survived if you hadn't found me."  
  
Of course she wouldn't have survived if he hadn't found her. She'd been trying to kill herself.  
  
And now he knew exactly why.  
  
She had never wanted anyone to know. To know why she woke up crying in the night, trying to cling to someone who wasn't there.  
  
And now he knew. The one she always woke up reaching for, the one person who could rip her heart out and leave her soulless, leave her empty and wanting and desperate.  
  
She had never wanted him to know, because, no matter how much she knew-deep inside-that he wouldn't turn her away, that he wouldn't rip her heart out. She had never trusted anyone after what had happened.  
  
Anyone.  
  
Even herself. 


	6. Chapter Six

What I Want, Chapter Six.  
  
"I'm sorry." He said. "I'm really sorry Kitty." He walked towards her slowly.  
  
She looked up at him, tears shining in her eyes. "It's ok Scott. Not your fault."  
  
"No." He said, kneeling down. "I could have done something. You should have told me earlier. You didn't have to keep it inside."  
  
"I did." She said. "You don't understand." She sighed, pulling him down to sit beside her. "I.I.I didn't want anyone to know that I'm not the perfect little girl I always act like.it's all an act you know? No one knows who I really am." Her voice was dark and hard. "No one knows about this." She said, turning up her wrists and looking at the scars, standing up between the tracks of raw, bloody skin. The sight of the blood made her insides size up. She started to cry.  
  
Scott pulling her shuddering body into his arms. "Shhh.Kitty, shhhh." He cradled her head into his chest, his thumb stroking the ball of her cheek. "Let it go.let it all go." Her sobs got harder, the tears running down her cheeks multiplied. And he held her until all that was left in her were breathless gasps for air. He had cradled her into his lap, holding onto her through hell as she cried herself dry.  
  
She looked up at him, his face concerned, but serene. "I'm sorry." She said.  
  
"No." He said. "Don't be." He tilted her face up until her eyes were in line with his, and though she couldn't see his eyes, he was sure she felt it. There was a tension between them like electricity. His lips were tingling, and it felt as if he would die if he didn't kiss her. His hand slipped behind her head, and he pulled her closer to him.  
  
When she was close enough, he brushed his lips over hers, and a shock ran through him before she pulled away. "No." She said, closing her eyes. "Not right now."  
  
He didn't have anything to say. He'd felt more in that one soft brushing of lips than in a thousand passionate kisses with Jean. He'd felt the world exploding around him, and then contracting until it was only them. He sighed softly and then stood up, bringing her with him.  
  
"We should go and clean up those scratches." He said.  
  
She nodded dumbly, her eyes wide and vacant as he gathered up her sheets and led her to the med-lab. Why had she stopped him? Couldn't she just have let him keep on kissing her? It had been so nice, so.blissful.  
  
When they got into the elevator, she turned to him. "Listen." She said. "Thank you."  
  
He reached out and took her hand. "You're welcome."  
  
Her fingers toyed with his engagement ring as she held his hand. He was beginning to understand why she had pulled away. Why she had said no.  
  
He was engaged.he was still promised to someone else. And she had honor. 


	7. Chapter Seven

What I Want, Chapter Seven.  
  
She hadn't left her room. She couldn't. Not to face the fact that the team was coming back today. After four days of sheer bliss, Jean would be coming back today, to rip apart the clinging illusions that someone had actually cared for her.  
  
That he had actually cared for her. Almost like she had cared for him.  
  
But she had no faith in him.  
  
~ ~ ~  
  
In his room, Scott was wondering exactly how he could break it to Jean-his partner of many years-that it was over. That he had fallen for someone else.  
  
He didn't know how, but he was sure that he had to. After all, Kitty didn't trust him yet, but she had to trust him eventually.  
  
He stood up, and looked at the clock. Eight thirty. And the team was due in at nine. It would be a good time to go get her, so that they could go down to the hanger, and wait, and talk.  
  
By the time he was at her room, he was shaking. What if she had only done this because she knew that there could be no consequences?  
  
He knocked on the door.  
  
And she opened it, looking like a bright, shining sun.  
  
And he couldn't stop smiling.  
  
Then she smiled, and he couldn't stop himself from reaching out to her, pulling her to him. "Just this once," he murmured to her. "Please."  
  
She nodded, and-almost instantaneously-he crushed his lips to hers.  
  
It was a good thing that the door was closed, or they would have gone crashing to the floor.  
  
And neither of them would have noticed. They were too absorbed in each other.  
  
His hands snaked around her waist, and hers came up to fist in his hair. His hands slid down, and pulled her closer to him.  
  
And suddenly, she felt trapped.  
  
The memories came in flashes, just as they had the first night.  
  
*Hands, all over her, riding over her breasts, her hips, her thighs. Pulling her closer to him, closer.*  
  
She went limp, her hands slipping from his hair to hang limply at her sides. Her mouth stilling, head falling back.  
  
*"No one will ever love you now." Whipping her, fronts of her thighs taking the brunt of it, blood seeping out of the gashes. "Especially not after this." She struggled to free herself, to untie her arms, to be able to stop him.*  
  
But this time, she wasn't tied up. "Stop." She whimpered quietly, then brought her hands up to his chest. "Stop it!" He kept on kissing her neck, inching up to her ear.  
  
She straightened he back, then pushed him, hard.  
  
"Kitty." He said, his voice cracking.  
  
"I'm sorry." She replied, closing her eyes. "So sorry."  
  
"Don't be." He said. "It's my fault." He was still *with* Jean, still with Jean. But it was so hard to remember that when she looked at him with those soft, giving eyes.  
  
"No, it isn't." She replied. "You're nothing like him."  
  
"Who?"  
  
Her eyes were wide. How could he not know? "No one." She said. He knew. Of course he knew.  
  
He didn't, but the soft hurt in her eyes was enough to make him stop questioning why she had done what she had done. "Kitty, I'm so sorry." He held out his arms, willing her to step into them. When she did, he closed his eyes, and just held her. Safe.  
  
Suddenly she pulled away from him. "We should go down. They're due any minute."  
  
"Okay." He said, willing to give her whatever she wanted. "Let's go." 


	8. Chapter Eight

What I Want, Chapter Eight.  
  
"Shut up." She said. "You're lying."  
  
"No, seriously, I can sing. I was in the state choir for five years.before, well, you know."  
  
"OK, sing something." She replied tartly. She hadn't actually expected him to tell her something.so, well, personal.when she asked him to tell her something about him that no one else knew.  
  
"What do you want me to sing?"  
  
"Amazing grace." She said, rolling her eyes. He knew she sang, he had come upon her doing just that several times when she thought she was alone. And she figured he was joking when he said that he did.  
  
"Amazing grace, how sweet the sound," he started, and her jaw fell open. He *could* sing, and very well. "Told you." He whispered, and then continued the song to it's end. "So." He said after the last note died down. "Sing something for me."  
  
"That was so good." She said, throwing her arms around his shoulders. "I didn't know you were so good."  
  
"I'm not that good." He replied. "I'm decent.but I bet you're good. So, sing something for me."  
  
"I can't." She replied. She'd hoped he'd drop it. Singing was the one thing she had to herself, the one thing that she couldn't let anyone know about.  
  
"Come on, yes you can." He slipped his arms around her waist. "Sing 'Don't Cry For Me Argentina.'"  
  
She breathed in deeply, and then out slowly. "I can't." She said. "I've never sung for anyone. Ever." At least, no one like him.  
  
"I've heard you sing." He said, hoping she would give in soon.  
  
"Yeah, well, I just.I'm not ready."  
  
"Yes you are, Kitty, I know you are. Sing something for me."  
  
"Fine." She said. "It won't be easy, you'll think it strange." She began, then closed her eyes. "When I try to explain how I feel, that I still need your love, after all that I've done." She was cut off by the jet engines.  
  
He grabbed her hand. "That was beautiful. You're wonderful." Then he squeezed her hand. "I'm going to need to." Then the doors opened, and he let go of her hand. "Just, um." But Jean had already called out his name, and run over, and began to kiss him, heatedly.  
  
"I missed you so much!" She said into his mouth, and then began to kiss him again.  
  
It hurt to see them kiss. She didn't know why, it could have been because she had been doing the same thing less than an hour ago, or because he didn't seem to be resisting.  
  
"Let's go to the room." Scott said. Her eyes bulged. He had been pretending with her, waiting for Jean to come back. It didn't surprise her when tears came to her eyes. And then, crying, she went back up to her room.  
  
She should have known. She should have known. 


	9. Chapter Nine

What I Want, Chapter Nine.  
  
"Jean.Jean, please, stop." He pulled her arms from around his neck, and backed away from her.  
  
"Why? We've been apart almost a week and a half. I need you so bad."  
  
"We need to talk." She pulled his mouth back to hers, but he didn't respond at all.  
  
"We can talk later." She said. "Please."  
  
"No.I need to.we need to talk."  
  
"Argh!" She groaned, then fell onto the bed. "Fine, talk." She began to unbutton her shirt, as he started pacing.  
  
"Jean." He began, then paused, as he looked at her.  
  
"Yeah, that's my name." She replied, then peeled off her shirt.  
  
"Things haven't been.good.between us for a long time." He said. "You know that as well as I do."  
  
"The sex is still good." She said, then took off her bra, and began crawling towards him. "That's all I want right now."  
  
"Jean, that's not the point." He paused, then threw a blanket at her. "And we're not doing that right now."  
  
"Scott, please, come on."  
  
"I need to talk to you. Things changed when you were gone."  
  
"Things changed when you were gone." She mocked him playfully. "Come on, I just want to fuck."  
  
"No, not right now. I already told you. Now would you please listen."  
  
"Fine." She said, then moved up the bed and sat against the head board.  
  
"We both know that this, between us, has been over for a long time." He said. "And, while you were gone, um, I."  
  
"Kitty." She said.  
  
"Yeah." He replied, then sighed. "How did you know?"  
  
"You can't shield your dreams, Scott. I see her almost every night. Doing things to you."  
  
"I'm so sorry." He said.  
  
"Don't worry about it." She said, beginning to tear up. "Like you said, we both knew it was over before this happened."  
  
"Jean, I'm sorry." He said. "I really am.I just, I think I love her, and, I can't keep lying to you, because I love you too."  
  
"Scott, no." She said, then walked up to him. "It's okay. I understand. It has been over for a long time.but I do still love you.just, not like that anymore, I guess."  
  
"Yeah." He said, then pulled her into his arms in a hug. "I love you too."  
  
That, of course, was the moment Kitty decided to peek through the door.  
  
She wasn't trying to invade their privacy, she really wasn't.but she couldn't stand not to know.  
  
And now, she did. She ducked out as quickly as she could, crying softly. Of course he had been right, no one could love her after what had happened.  
  
"Thank you." Scott said, moving back from Jean. "I can't tell you how grateful I am for this.understanding."  
  
She nodded. "I do understand." She said. "But could you.do me a favor, and, um, not." She choked up, something strangling her voice in her throat. Her lips were trembling, and she was trying hard not to cry. ".do anything in public with her. I don't want to.I want to have time to come to terms with it."  
  
"Okay." He said. "Jean, I didn't, do anything with her while you were gone."  
  
"I know." She said. "But, I just, need time to adjust, okay."  
  
"Yes." Then he wrapped his arms around her again. "I'm going to go talk to the professor about getting a new room."  
  
"Okay." She said. "Is it okay if I stay in this one?"  
  
"Jean, it's always been your room." He said. "Of course you can." He went to the corner and picked up a bag that he had packed that morning. "I'll be back tonight for this.and to give you the other key.I'll come back some other time for the rest of my stuff."  
  
"Okay Scott." She said. "Goodbye."  
  
"Jean." He said. "You don't hate me for this, do you?"  
  
"Of course I do." She said. "But only a little. It's okay.neither of us were happy in this relationship, and I'm sure we'll be much happier out of it." She smiled through the eminent tears. "Now get out. You don't want to leave her waiting for too long."  
  
"I hope we can still be friends."  
  
"We can." She said. "It'll just take a while. Now, leave."  
  
"Goodbye."  
  
"'Bye." She said, and, when the door was closed, she collapsed onto the bed crying.  
  
Of course she didn't love him that much.but it still hurt to be usurped by another woman, and.well, she thought he was her future. But, not anymore. 


	10. Chapter Ten

What I Want, Chapter Ten.  
  
First she cried.  
  
It was inevitable that she would cry. She had had almost a week of pure Scott.  
  
She knew now that she loved him totally.  
  
But he wasn't hers, and he never would be.  
  
So she cried.  
  
Then she wondered what she should do.  
  
She couldn't stay. Not after having seen what she had seen. She had to get out immediately, if not sooner. That phrase had never made sense to her before. But now it did.  
  
So she packed her bags, and went and saw the professor. He was psychic, so he knew why she was doing it. She didn't lie.  
  
"I have to go." She said simply, not saying anything else.  
  
"Kitty." He said, but she shook her head.  
  
"I've been accepted to Julliard." Something no one knew but her. She prepped in her room, she had lessons in the city, she had told everyone that she had psychiatrist appointments when she went to them.  
  
And when she went to the audition, she told them she was having a spree weekend.  
  
No one questioned it.  
  
Or, at least, no one said anything.  
  
"Kitty, I know." He said. "But you haven't finished High School yet."  
  
"If you know that," her best kept secret. "Then you must know that I can't stay here right now to finish highschool." She paused, her plea in her eyes. "I'm leaving. At the end of the year, you can send me my diploma. You know I've done the work."  
  
"Kitty." He said softly as she began to walk away. "I've got an apartment in New York.I want you to stay there." He paused. "You may not be a student here anymore, but I'm still responsible for you." He pulled a folder out of a drawer, and rolled around the desk to give it to her. "The directions to the building are in there, as are the keys to the apartment." He looked up at her. "I'll send you your things."  
  
She smiled softly. Of course Xavier understood. He always did. "Thank you." She said.  
  
He nodded, and as she began to walk away again, he said "There's also a credit card in there." She turned, paused. He had known this was coming. Of course he had, he had always known everything. "Use it on anything."  
  
He knew she wouldn't; of course, she had too much pride.too much guilt. But it would always be there for her, and he knew she knew that.  
  
"Thanks again." She said, her cool smile warming. She leaned down and brushed her cheek against his.  
  
"Use the convertible." He said suddenly.  
  
She gasped.  
  
"The keys are on the third peg from the left, two down." He paused. "It's yours."  
  
"It's too much." She said. "I'm leaving, I'm not coming back again."  
  
But he knew she would, and that was the point. "It's yours." He insisted. "Everything I've given you is yours. Now, go." He said, a wry and knowing smile on his face.  
  
"Thank you." She said, her affection for him blooming in her heart, as she walked out the door. "Goodbye."  
  
"Goodbye." Charles said as the door closed.  
  
But he knew it wasn't really goodbye. And nothing he had just done had been impulsive.  
  
He would do anything to help two lost souls find each other. Especially because he loved them both. 


	11. Chapter Eleven

What I Want, Chapter Eleven.  
  
"You just let her go?" Scott almost screamed at Charles. "You just let her walk out of here?"  
  
"Scott, I can't stop her."  
  
"Well, you damn well should have tried."  
  
"I did." He said calmly, his tone placating. "But she's over eighteen. She always had the right to leave here whenever she wanted."  
  
"And you let her." Scott replied, and walked out of the room.  
  
He couldn't believe it. Couldn't believe it. But he knew it was his fault. For going off with Jean before explaining to her that he was only going to break it off. For not telling her how he felt.  
  
He had been in lust with her at the beginning of the week, and now, he was almost certain, he was in love.  
  
He ran his hands over his bristled jaw, and walked slowly to her room. He opened the door and slid inside.  
  
She wasn't there, but he could smell her, he could almost feel her. Sitting down tersely on the bed, he groaned. Even when she wasn't there, he could feel her there, he could imagine her touching him, making love to him.  
  
As he stood up, he tried to bank the lust that was fogging his mind. He would never have her. Never. And the realization hit him like a knife in his stomach.  
  
He would never have her. Ever. The one woman he might have had a possibility of being happy with, and he couldn't even tell her how he felt. Couldn't ever know if she had left because she felt the same way, or because of her pride.  
  
And damnit, he wanted to. Even if it was just her pride, he wanted to know. He wanted to try and coax the feelings he had in his heart out of her. He wanted to let her know that she was.just.perfect.  
  
He wanted to see her too, to touch her, to make her feel all the pleasure that her body could contain. To kiss her until her lips were swollen and red, and she could hardly breathe anymore. Until she was on fire with him, and he with her.  
  
He wanted to talk to her, to help her let go of everything inside of her that she thought was dark, or scary, or different. He wanted to tell her his secrets. He wanted her to understand.  
  
And God, he couldn't even try.  
  
He sat down at the desk.the vanity.whatever it was, and looked at himself in the mirror.  
  
Everything he saw was red. He had almost forgotten what color other things were, blue, green, yellow, they all faded into the murky redness. He could tell light from dark, but blue, green and brown were difficult to separate.  
  
That's why he'd had to ask her what color her eyes were, when they'd first met. After she'd recovered, he'd been struck with her eyes, they had the perfect shape, they were intense, sad, and dark. And they were brown. He remembered her softly bitter laugh as she had said it.she thought they were ordinary, he knew, but they weren't.they were beautiful, only someone who couldn't see color could see that.  
  
And so it was only him.  
  
He'd wanted her from the beginning. From the very beginning, damnit. And he hadn't done anything then.  
  
And when he had, he went and screwed it all up.  
  
He slammed his fist into the mirror.  
  
He had screwed it up. All of it.  
  
He felt the pain in his hand, and looked down. Blood. He was bleeding. It wasn't difficult to recognize the blood, even through the red tint of his world.  
  
He went into her bathroom.  
  
There was still a towel lying on the floor, one she hadn't picked up that morning. And, hanging from the door on a hanger, was the slip she'd been wearing the night when he'd seen her in the laundry room.  
  
He smiled softly. It still smelled like she had that night. Sweet and clean, with a hint of her tears, and his sweat. He touched it, just one brief stroke against the soft material, and he couldn't stand it anymore.  
  
He pulled the slip off of the hanger, and pressed it against his chest. "I love you, Kitty." He said, and then walked out into the bedroom, fell on the bed, and lost himself in his tears.  
  
It was hours before anyone came looking for him. 


	12. Chapter Twelve

What I Want, Chapter Twelve.  
  
He figured that he should have known, that nothing would work out, and that he would end up breaking down like that.  
  
But he hadn't.  
  
And he had been out of it for days.  
  
It was the remembering that set him off. The scent of laundry, the sight of blood, almost anything.  
  
He was restless. Stupid. He went on a mission.  
  
And now he wasn't staying in Kitty's room anymore, but in the med-lab, because he hadn't even tried to defend himself when Sabertooth came at him, claws bared.  
  
The worst part of it all was that he wasn't even unconscious. He couldn't move at all, but his mind was working, crying out for her, yelling at himself.  
  
It took three months before he got better, and even then he felt brittle, his nerves were on edge, and he couldn't last a minute without thinking about her.  
  
And he moved back into Kitty's room. He didn't keep it the way it had been as most probably thought he would, but moved things around, added his own stuff on the desk, his CD's to her collection. So that, sometimes, in the morning, he could wake up and think, for just a moment, that she hadn't left, and that they were together. Really together.  
  
But that happiness wouldn't last for long. It would fall apart in minutes, and he would be left crying, again.  
  
"Scott, I'm worried about you." Said the professor one day after summoning Scott for a talk.  
  
"I know." Scott said. "I understand why."  
  
"You need to move on." The professor said, hoping, just for a moment, that Scott understood that.  
  
"I need her." He said. His voice was defiant, but under that there was a longing, a need.  
  
"I know." The professor said. "But you can't stay like this. You need to move on, or try and find her.  
  
So that's what he did. 


	13. Chapter Thirteen

What I Want, Chapter Thirteen.  
  
"I want to rip your eyes out,  
  
I want to blind you with my pain,  
  
I want to take you from my heart forever,  
  
I never want to see you again." She began.  
  
The first Stanza was her favorite. It was soft, quiet, filled with the passion, but not the speed or the volume of the rest of the song.  
  
It was like she was crying.  
  
Of course, she also hated it. She had been so weak, so fragile. And, goddamnit, she still wanted him.  
  
"That was real good, Kitts, but you've got to keep going if we want a gig."  
  
"Oh, yeah, sorry." She said, "From the top?"  
  
Mitch nodded, and flashed her a cheeky grin. He wanted inside her pants, and she knew it, but she wouldn't let him. And he knew it.  
  
Or so she hoped. "We already have a gig, by the way." She said before he started the chords again.  
  
Everyone looked at her. "What?" Carmine said after a considerable silence.  
  
"We're playing at Aqua Thursday night." Kitty said.  
  
"No shit?" Asked Dan.  
  
"No, of course, I'm shitting you." She said, then rolled her eyes. "What the hell do you think?"  
  
"Kitty, we've only got five songs ready." Said Mitch, who-for all his heat and leather-was a very organized person.  
  
"Five songs is more than enough." She said. "We're only opening."  
  
"How many do we need."  
  
"Joce' said half an hour, give or take, and."  
  
"You got this through Jocelyn?" Interrupted Carmine.  
  
"She does own the club, you know?"  
  
"She also lives next door." Said Mitch, knowingly. "Kitty, none of us want this gig if it's not for the music."  
  
"And it is for the music." She said, rolling her eyes at her friends' stubbornness, and stepping down from the mic platform, sliding down onto the chaise behind her. "She's only heard us rehearsing about ninety thousand times. She asked me if we would do it this morning."  
  
"Kitty, you know we're grateful for the opportunity, right.but, if we didn't.earn it, what's the point?" Said Dan, standing up from behind his drums. "I mean,"  
  
"I know what you mean, Danny, but, we did." They were all looking at her. "Really." She said, then she leaned her head back, her fingers were pulsing, and she didn't know why. "She offered before, if we wanted a venue, I knew you guys wouldn't go for it, so I said no."  
  
"So what makes you think she's genuine this time?" Asked Carmine.  
  
"She called me to tell me that she had a band." Kitty said, sitting back up. "She said she hadn't called anyone else before me. And Jocelyn may be nice, but not nice enough to sacrifice herself."  
  
"I vote we do it." Mitch said, setting down his guitar. "Just for kicks if nothing else."  
  
Carmine laughed. "Sure.might as well." She still didn't think it was a good idea, but, if Mitch was okay with it, she was too. He was the icing on her cake. Rather, he was the cake. She wanted him so bad, she couldn't stand the way he looked at Kitty. He only wanted her because she was the broken one. Carmine knew it, Kitty knew it, Dan knew it, everyone knew it, except Mitch, who probably hadn't realized that he wanted to be needed, and he thought Kitty was the one who needed him the most.  
  
When, of course, it was the one who acted as if she really really didn't.  
  
"Let's just run through this one more time." Kitty said. "I've got to stop spacing out after that first verse." Which, Carmine knew very well, was because of the guy in the picture frame she always had tipped down on her nightstand.  
  
She'd tipped it up once, when she had been 'going to the bathroom.' He was hot. She admitted that first off, but, he had this smile, it wasn't real, but it wasn't as if he wanted anyone to think it was. It was just sad. And behind that picture-Car' just really had to check if there was anything written on the back-there was a picture of him and Kitty. His arm was slung around her, and his bare chest looked as if it was quivering as it brushed against her arm. Kitty was blushing, just a little bit, and her eyes were filled with something like love.  
  
And both of their smiles were genuine.  
  
"What you runnin' from Kit-Kat?" She had asked the picture, and then gently slid it back into the frame.  
  
Of course, Kitty didn't know she knew. And she'd rather keep it that way than betray one of her only friends.  
  
"So, from the top?" Asked Kitty.  
  
"Why the hell not?" Said Dan, and started tapping out the beat. Carmine and Mitch stayed silent as they counted out their beats. Kitty started singing after five. "I want to rip your eyes out." Carmine came in on the keyboard after one beat, and one after that, Kitty sang: "I want to blind you with my pain." Mitch riffed in one beat later, and she sang: "I want to take you from my heart forever." They all paused, one, two, three endless beats. "I never want to see you again."  
  
"I hate you for what you did to me," Kitty sang, her voice raising, dipping, meshing in harmony with her band, her friends. "You'd be better off dead." She smiled softly, and imagined how she would sing it. Presentation is nine tenths of a good performance, she had always thought. "Oh, even though I feel this way," Everyone paused. "I can't get you out of my head."  
  
"I don't want you to be,  
  
"Here, inside of me,  
  
"Why can't you just leave me alone?  
  
"I don't love you anymore,  
  
"Don't want to see you anymore,  
  
"I don't need you anymore,  
  
"Much." Mitch breezed through the interlude, only looking back at her once or twice, and she closed her eyes. "Take off your damn sunglasses, let me look into your soul? Take off your damn protections, I don't want to need you anymore.I don't want to love you anymore. But baby, I do, love the way you were before you broke my heart, I do, love the way you were before you tore me apart. But, I don't want to, I don't need to, I don't love you, anymore."  
  
The last notes faded away, and she blinked her tears away. "Good run." She said. "Same time tomorrow." She said, and hoped that they would leave before she cried. 


	14. Chapter Fourteen

What I Want, Chapter Fourteen.  
  
The one thing that Kitty didn't like about New York was that the city never did sleep. She couldn't ever run off her frustrations, and she didn't want to use the professors card to buy a membership to a gym somewhere, or a treadmill.  
  
Of course, she was already using it more than she'd like to have. Parking for the car, food, clothes sometimes. With school, and the band, she didn't have time to hold down a job, and her savings had been eaten up really fast.  
  
Another thing she didn't like about New York was how expensive it was to live there.  
  
Mitch hadn't left immediately, therefore Car' hadn't left immediately, and was again in Kitty's bedroom, looking at her picture of Scott, again under the pretense of going to the bathroom.  
  
Why the hell did that man not come after her?  
  
"Kitty, what's wrong?" Asked Mitch, coming up behind her, setting his hand on her shoulder.  
  
"Nothing." She said. She was used to the touching thing, everyone artsy touched more, she found out very soon after starting at Julliard.  
  
"Much?" He asked, sliding his hands down her arms. He was at her back, it was very disconcerting.  
  
"Yeah." She said, turning around, he was a lot closer to her than she thought. She backed up.  
  
"Kitty." He said, walking closer to her. "You know how I feel, don't you?"  
  
She took three steps back. She didn't want to hurt him, and she knew it was more than attraction, but if she had to, she did. "I know." She said. His eyes lit up. "But, Mitch, I can't, I'm.in love with someone else."  
  
"Who?" He asked, the light dropping from his eyes. His voice was hard, suspicious. She was always with him, or Dan, or Carmine, and they would have told him if she met up with another guy.  
  
"He doesn't live around here." She said. "Westchester."  
  
"So, why haven't I seen him around. That's not that far away."  
  
"We broke it off before I came here." She said. Or rather, he did.  
  
"But you won't even let me try?"  
  
"Listen. I was hurt before him, and I trusted him, and I didn't think he would hurt me, but he did." She paused. "I'm not ready."  
  
"I'll be gentle."  
  
"That's the point. I know you would, but." She looked up. "He was too, I'm just not ready to be with anyone else." He opened his mouth, she placed her first two fingers against it. "I don't know if I ever will be." Then she paused, leaned in and kissed his cheek. "Please don't ask me again."  
  
He nodded tersely. "I won't." He said. Then he swallowed. "Tell Car' I left?" He asked.  
  
"Sure." She said, and then reached out to grasp his arm. "I really am sorry."  
  
"Not your fault." He said, and smiled softly. "Don't worry about it."  
  
"Okay." She said, and nodded slightly.  
  
He walked to the door, and smiled before he walked out. He didn't want her to be hurt because he was. Kitty would be to. He knew that, she was just like that.  
  
He leaned against the wall next to the door once he got out. He'd get over it. That much was true. He wasn't in love with her, he liked her, and he was attracted to her. He felt a certain possessiveness about her, but only because she was so youthful, so innocent.  
  
Kitty fell onto the couch. He was so stubborn. So sweet though.  
  
She opened her eyes when she heard footsteps. "Car'." She said. "Hey."  
  
"Wha's wrong?" She asked.  
  
"Not too much." She said. "You'll be glad to hear that Mitch is, or soon will be, over me."  
  
Car looked down at Kitty. "You knew?"  
  
"I always know these things." She said.  
  
"Who does Dan like?" Asked Carmine.  
  
"Professor Jopelain." Said Kitty. Car's eyes widened. The said professor was male, and, actually only three years older than them. "It's true." Said Kitty. "He talks too much about his lectures, just hints."  
  
"You've always been able to read people like this?" She asked.  
  
"Hardly." Said Kitty with a laugh. "It started a couple of years ago."  
  
"Oh." She said. "So, anything that would perk my hopes with Mitch."  
  
"No." Kitty said solemnly.  
  
Car's face fell.  
  
"You are so gullible." Said Kitty. "He likes you more than he liked me, just he doesn't think he should. You're not his type."  
  
Car rolled her eyes. "You're just saying that."  
  
"The hell I am." Kitty said. "And ruin my record of always being honest?"  
  
"You're such a geek!" Said Carmine. "You're always honest? If I'm the pope."  
  
Kitty smiled. "Chica, you need to learn to take a joke." She said, trailing off into laughter.  
  
"Yeah, joke that he likes me."  
  
"No." Kitty said. "That part was true."  
  
"Liar!"  
  
"I'm not, seriously, it's totally true."  
  
Carmine rolled her eyes. "If you're so good with reading emotions, then why don't you have a guy of your own?"  
  
"Maybe I don't like guys." She said, then smiled coyly at her friend.  
  
Carmine's eyes widened, then she blinked. "Right, okay, and I don't like Mitch."  
  
"Fine, you caught me. That's why I could never act." She smiled. "The only guy I've ever really liked doesn't really think of me like that." The corners of her mouth dropped a little bit, but she shrugged it off. "Didn't like something in my past."  
  
"Kitty." Said Carmine. "You'll get him back." Then, she picked up her coat, and was out the door sooner than Kitty could think.  
  
Her friends were the greatest, she thought, smiling. Understanding, genuine, wonderful.  
  
Of course, Car hadn't hidden that one thing from her.  
  
She got up, and walked into the bedroom. Flipped up the picture of Scott on her nightstand, and pried open the back.  
  
She pulled out the second picture, and smiled at it. She knew it that her current state wasn't worth the moment of happiness in the past, but still, she loved him. And always would. 


	15. Chapter Fifteen

Note: Dear All, you've been so great to read this.sorry it took so long to get up.I've been having a serious case of a lot of homework, and it's just subsiding.  
  
What I Want, Chapter Fifteen.  
  
Her heart was beating faster than a tribal drum. Stage fright and nerves were not something that was supposed to be in place the night of her first ever gig. She closed her eyes, and pushed them out of her mind. Car wasn't nervous, especially since Mitch had been a lot more attentive to her lately. Mitch wasn't nervous.he couldn't be. Dan was nervous, but that was how he was, not to mention that a certain teacher was in the audience. And she was nervous-not because she didn't know what she was doing, and not because she was afraid she'd screw up, the pressure had always motivated her, not scared her-but because she thought, maybe, just maybe, he would be there, waiting for her after she got off of the stage.  
  
That would be the way it always happened in the movies: Heroine does something she's been wanting to do, something fantastic, and the hero shows up.  
  
Heroine is going about normal daily life when the hero shows up.  
  
Heroine is coming home after a long day, and the hero shows up.  
  
Anyhow, she couldn't think about that, when she should be thinking about the performance. It could be their first ever break, and that would be gorgeous for all of them.  
  
By the time Jocelyn had kissed her cheek, and wished her good luck, she was shaking, and they weren't even on the stage yet.  
  
She had to get this under control.  
  
Then, they were out on stage, and they were warming up, and all of her nerves fled in the face of all the joy. She was finally going to do something substantial, something real. Something she'd always wanted to do. Finally.  
  
Jocelyn came out on stage. "Hey everybody, and welcome to Aqua, tonight we've got The Bringers, a smashing band from Ireland, and opening for them, a group that in their own right deserves the spotlight, Sleeping Starlight." She clapped, and everyone else clapped, and then the lights on the stage grew. They were starting off with "Eyes." Or Scott's song.  
  
The spotlight was on Dan, just at first. And he played, and as Kitty sang, the spotlight grew on her, and as Mitch played, his spotlight grew, and Carmine played, and she got the spotlight on her, and then, they were all spotlighted, and playing.  
  
And the song went off flawlessly, and so did the next song, and the next. And at the end of the set, the audience applauded vigorously. And one man in the back, his eyes shaded with red sunglasses, began to cry.  
  
Kitty walked off stage, and she was happy. And Mitch was happy, and Car' was happy, and Dan was happy. Suddenly Mitch and Car' were kissing, and Professor Jopelain came back to congratulate them, but he only talked to Dan.  
  
Kitty fell off the edge of the earth.  
  
She walked out, letting the others fall into their romantically happy abyss, and made her way to her apartment.  
  
Where the man in the red sunglasses followed her. 


	16. Chapter Sixteen

What I want, Chapter Sixteen.  
  
He followed her to the apartment building, and followed her in, at a safe distance. He could tell that she was almost crying, though, so it hardly mattered that she didn't see him, when he was certain that she wouldn't look.  
  
He waited until she was in her apartment before he went up the elevator, and knocked on her door.  
  
He'd brought a dozen red roses.  
  
He set them on the doorstep, knocked, and stood next to the door, waiting.  
  
It was a couple of minutes before she came to the door. Her eyes were red, and her skin blotchy.  
  
And when she looked out, all she saw was the flowers. She picked them up, then looked left, right. And she saw him.  
  
"Scott." She said. "What are you doing here?"  
  
"I want to talk to you." He said. "I saw you at the club. You were exquisite."  
  
"Thank you." She said. She was tempted, very tempted, to throw her arms around him, and kiss him until neither of them could breathe any more, but she couldn't. "Would you like to come in?"  
  
"Sure." He said, and stepped over the threshold after her.  
  
"I'm going to go put these in water." She said. Her voice was tense. She may have wished for this, but she had never expected it.  
  
But there he was, sitting in her front room, waiting for her to come out of the kitchen. Waiting for her to do what else?  
  
She filled a vase up with water, and then set the roses in it. She carried it out, and set it on her dining room table. "Would you like something to drink?" She asked him.  
  
"No." he said, wondering why she was being so tense. It wasn't as if she didn't know him. It wasn't as if they hadn't kissed, and she hadn't told him all of her deepest secrets. "I want to talk to you." He said again.  
  
"About what?" She asked.  
  
He blinked, twice. It would sound awkward. "You and me, and what happened."  
  
"We don't need to do that." She said. "I understand what happened, and it's fine with me. I've moved on."  
  
"Kitty." He said. "I don't think you do."  
  
"What's not to understand." She said. "You were bored, I was there."  
  
She didn't even sound bitter, she sounded like she didn't care. Like it was a fact, like it had happened before, and would happen again. "That's not it Kitty." He said.  
  
"Right." She said. "Then, why, exactly, did you go back to Jean the moment she walked in the door?"  
  
"I had to talk to her." He said. "Listen, I should have explained it better before she got there, but, I had to tell her that I couldn't be with her anymore." He paused, then looked at her. She didn't believe him. He knew she didn't believe him. "Kitty, you have to believe me."  
  
"Right." She said. "That's why it's taken you eight months to come and tell me?"  
  
"It's a long story." He said. "I'm not sure if you would believe me."  
  
"I won't." She said. "Now, it was nice seeing you, but I'll have to ask you to leave."  
  
"I'll come back." He said.  
  
"That's nice." She said. "I'll still be here, and I still won't believe you."  
  
Then, she stood up, and he walked to the door with her. Then, before he walked out, he took her hand, and kissed it, and then stepped out, and closed the door.  
  
She collapsed against the door, and began to cry. 


	17. Chapter Seventeen

Note: Come into this chapter with an open mind, some of the plot may not be what it seems.  
  
What I Want, Chapter Seventeen.  
  
"Kitty come on, wherever you have to go for (quote) 'The Holiday Season' can't be that important." Car' made her puppy dog eyes. "Please stay, we'll have fun."  
  
"I won't be gone the whole time Car', I just have to get something done, and then I'll be back."  
  
"This something you have to 'do' doesn't have anything to do with a certain hot guy I saw following you out of the club before, does it?"  
  
She froze. Car' had seen him. She knew about the picture, and she had seen him follow her out of the club.  
  
Jesus.  
  
"No, it doesn't have to do with him. I want to check in with a couple of my old friends, and talk to my benefactor about the state of things."  
  
"But Kitty, Pweez, I've got a cabin up in the country, and all the guys are coming, along with several of the girls, it'd be so fun. First Christmas away from home."  
  
Car' didn't know that Kitty'd already had a Christmas away from home, and it hadn't been fun. "I'm Jewish Carmine, and I've got to go back."  
  
"Fine." She said, pouting. "Go." She sniffled, and then looked at Kitty with mirth in her eyes. "I'm giving you directions in case you get done early." Then she threw her arms around Kitty. "Love you, chica."  
  
"You too." She said, and then pulled away. "I'm gonna go finish packing. Got to get on the road before the snow starts coming down too hard."  
  
"Yep." Said Car'. "Stay safe."  
  
"You too." She said, and went back to finish packing as Carmine let herself out.  
  
An hour later she was on the road.  
  
Half an hour after that, she was sitting in her car in front of a familiar mansion, wondering if she should go in.  
  
She closed her eyes and breathed in and out twice, then set the car in park, pulled out the keys and grabbed her bag from the passenger seat.  
  
Only the professor was expecting her. She walked in, and made her way to his office. She knocked twice, and as his voice called out, let herself in. "Hello Professor." She said, closing the door behind her.  
  
And a man sitting in a high backed chair turned around to look at her. "He's not here right now." He said.  
  
Kitty blinked. "Scott." She said. "Hi." Her eyes flared in surprise for a moment as she set her bag down. "Where is he?"  
  
"Out of the building at the moment." His eyes flared as well, but not in surprise, in anger. "He said you'd called him a couple of weeks ago, and told him you'd be coming for the holidays. And since he had to go deal with a situation, he asked me to see you in."  
  
"Oh." She said. She'd hoped, somewhere inside her that she wouldn't even see Scott the whole trip, that she could take a couple of days to catch up with her friends, and then she would go home without having to relive the scene they'd had in her apartment. But apparently not. "Well okay.it's good to see you."  
  
"You too." He said, catching his smile before it met his lips. "Let me take you to your room."  
  
"Okay" She said, and started to grab her bag.  
  
"I'll get it." He said, and then, taking her suitcase in one hand, opened the door and lead her out of the room.  
  
"So, how've things been?" He asked her as they walked down the hallway.  
  
"Good." She said. "We've had a couple of gigs after the one you saw, longer ones, and Mitch has been hinting at something after next month, I don't know what it is.I sang in the winter concert at school, and the performance got several good reviews.not much else. You?"  
  
"I've been teaching more." He said. "Gave up leadership of the team to Logan.some other things."  
  
"Okay." She said. But she was surprised.  
  
"Here's your place." He said, and opened the door to a guest room.  
  
"Thanks." She said, and he walked inside behind her, then closed the door.  
  
He set down her suitcase, and turned around. "You do know that this isn't over don't you?" He said. "Between you and me."  
  
"I know no such thing." She said as she walked into the bathroom. "This is a nice room." She walked to the door, acting as if he hadn't said what he had said. Then she opened the door.  
  
He walked towards the door, towards her, and then slammed the door shut. "I'm not leaving quite yet." He said, and then pushed her against the door. "And this is not over yet."  
  
He closed his hands around her wrists, and pressed his body hard against hers. "I love you." He said. But it sounded harsh, and more of a curse than a blessing.  
  
She pushed against him, he *hadn't* said it. She *hadn't* heard it. "Get off of me."  
  
"Kitty, I want you to ask yourself why I would say that if it weren't true." He said. "I love you."  
  
His mouth was a millimeter away from hers, hovering. His body was hard and long, and pressed against hers. She didn't feel trapped, she felt.needy.  
  
She moved a fraction of an inch forward, and their lips were touching. His were soft, scratchy and warm on hers, and the pleasure that throbbed in her temples began to curl into her stomach until she was weak and shuddering against him.  
  
Their lips began to move, and his hands slid up from her wrists to cup her waist, and her arms, finally free, came up to tangle in his hair.  
  
She gasped, sighed, surrendered. But she felt in total control.  
  
He would stop if she asked. So she didn't ask, when his nimble fingers slid under her shirt, stroking at the soft, supple skin of her back, she only gasped and reached down to pull off his shirt.  
  
He tentatively began to unbutton her shirt, waiting for her to stop him, but she didn't, and when her shirt was off, and her bra came off, and their chests were pressing against each other, his hard muscles against her soft breasts, they both knew it wouldn't stop, that neither of them would be sated until it was over. 


	18. Chapter Eighteen

What I Want, Chapter Eighteen.  
  
They didn't sate each other though. Kitty knew it was a dream, a fantasy, that he would say that, the he would do that. Not Scott.  
  
She walked to the door, and he walked out. Nothing. He said it wasn't over, but did nothing.  
  
She couldn't even breathe. "I want to blind you with my pain." She whispered, and then curled up on the bed.  
  
Even if he had said that, had done that, she wouldn't have been able to follow him. Kissing was almost too much. It had almost been too much when they'd done it before, but he didn't even want her anymore.  
On the other side of the door, Scott leaned against the wall, and wondered what he could do.  
  
He didn't consider once that she had no idea what he felt, what she should do either.  
  
As he walked down the hall, he heard the creaking open of a door, and looked back, but he must have imagined it. Besides, Kitty wouldn't need a door.  
That night at dinner, they sat as far apart as humanly possible, Kitty was on one end of the long table, sitting with Jean, the queen of the house, and several of the girls who'd returned for the holidays. Scott was on the other end, sitting with the Professor and Logan, the kings of the house, and the younger boys, who all wanted to absorb some of the power on that end of the table.  
  
Scott didn't belong with the powerful when he was so weak and needy.  
  
Kitty didn't belong with the feminine when she couldn't even kiss a man.  
  
They needed each other, but neither was weak enough to admit their pain.  
  
"So Kitts, how's the famous big apple?"  
  
"Good." She said. "It's fun, Julliard is so full of talent that I can hardly stand it though." She smiled, and asked Jubes how her life was in Chicago. The response was typical Jubilee, and she didn't worry.  
  
"How's life with the correspondence courses at the mansion?" Jubes asked Rogue.  
  
"Fine." She said. She was sitting the farthest from Jean, three down, and she shot a glance of poison at her every three seconds. "I'll tell you more tonight."  
  
"When we all steal into your room, and chat the whole night."  
  
Her smile bloomed slowly, and with a look that was so Rogue, she said "Yeah, when we chat till dawn." Rogue knew, of course, that she wouldn't keep whatever she said a secret from the woman at the end of the table.  
  
~*~  
  
"So." Said Jubilee that night. "Tell us all about New York."  
  
"Not much to tell." She said. "I joined a band, school's going really well, and.no romantic life to speak of."  
  
Jubilee sighed, and then turned to Rogue. "Roguey, baby, I know you've got something to tell me, something hidden inside that little skull of yours that you just can't wait to get out."  
  
Rogue smiled. No one could resist Jubilee after she had eaten a gallon of double fudge ripple and bananas. "Logan and I." She paused, and bit her lip. "He and I went on that road trip to Alaska, over the summer, you know, for my birthday.and." She paused again, wondering if she should tell anyone, afraid that if anyone knew, then it would stop what had been started. "He kissed me."  
  
Jubilee laughed, and Rogue blushed, but she went on. "Then, over the year, he started to ignore Jean, like, not even half-flirting with her like he did before, just kind of stopped paying attention to her.and we went out, on a date, and we kissed again, and, well, then we kind of got deeper, and stuff." Rogue was bright red, and Jubilee was holding in another spurt of laughter. "Then..." She trailed off. "That's it, really, mostly.just some more stuff, like, we keep making out and stuff. And now Jean hates me."  
  
"Jean hates everyone since Scott broke up with her." Jubilee said. "She wanted a quick rebound, and you took it from her, I mean, it's so obvious."  
  
"When did Scott break up with Jean?" Kitty asked softly, she hoped it sounded casual, but knew that it probably sounded worried.  
  
"Right after you left." Said Jubilee. "Actually, I thought that was a bit odd, I mean, everyone knows the guy has loved you forever, but I mean, why not before you left." She rolled her eyes. "Who knows?"  
  
Jubilee was being too casual about it. Too disjointed, trying to shake the subject. "What happened after I left?" Kitty asked.  
  
"What do you mean?" Asked Jubilee, Rogue sat quietly on the bed, blushing.  
  
"What happened, other than that, after I left?"  
  
"It's not a bit deal, Kitty." Said Jubilee. "But we didn't think you'd want to know."  
  
"I want to know Jubilation-Lee, now tell me." Kitty was getting angry. Everyone had to keep something from her. Everyone.  
  
"Scott had a breakdown." Jubilee said. And Kitty knew that Scott hadn't been lying when he'd said that it wasn't over. 


	19. Chapter Nineteen

What I want, Chapter Nineteen.  
  
Scott woke up panting in the middle of the night, a scream on the tip of his tongue, and wanting to die. Dreams came for reasons, always, and this one was not the only one he knew was not a coincidence.  
  
It was her, sitting on the washer, crying, like she had been the night he found her. Only this time, no one was there for her, he wasn't there to save her, to make her feel better as she peeled away at herself, just wasn't there.  
  
He'd had dreams like that before, ones where she was crying, and on the other side of a glass wall. The symbolism in that dream was almost too simple for him to even think about. One of the dreams was her looking down into his grave maliciously. That one wasn't too hard to decypher either. But for the last few weeks, starting with a dream of him not finding her in the woods, with her dying, and then him not finding her on the roof-and though he knew now that she wasn't going to-and her falling, and then this time, him not being there that night...he just didn't know what it meant. And it was driving him insane.  
  
He walked by the laundry room just in case-though it was out of his way-on the way out the door to run. No one was there.  
  
Of course no one was there. Kitty hated him for what he did to her, betraying her. He hated himself, so how could he expect her not to? He couldn't, and didn't.  
  
By the time he was outside, the night air crisp and ripe with a promise of snow, he ran, and ran into the woods surrounding the school, fled past the signs signifying camping areas, places to pitch fires, nature hikes, benches, picnic tables, and fountains, until he came to the place he was looking for. A stream, rather, a small, false water feature that Charles had installed probably when he had built the school, and then forgotten about.  
  
Every time his mind was racing, he would run and run, and he would end up there, so he could sit down and eventually the chaotic ropes of his thought would rearrange themselves into lines, so that he could listen to them and understand them like he listened to the lull of the river.  
  
He'd come before to think about Kitty, but it had never helped. She was too chaotic in his mind, so many things centered around her. Every thought, every wish to save the world, and each plea to the gods that she might return, every leaf on every tree in the autumn made him think of her brown hair, her peachy skin, and he went insane with it.  
  
He might think now, might just weave his thoughts into a recognizable pattern so that he could know what to do.  
  
But he sat there for hours, what seemed like centuries, and his mind remained as busy as it had been before, only now it was more tired.  
  
Scott shifted to the ground, and leaned his head against the rock he'd been sitting on. Maybe just a short rest, and he'd be able to run back. And as he closed his eyes, the vision behind them was of a girl screaming, and him not finding her. 


	20. Chapter Twenty

What I Want, Chapter Twenty.  
  
They spoke for hours more, Kitty pretending that she didn't remember what Marie and Jubilee had said about Scott.  
  
He'd fallen apart? Fallen apart, like a rag doll after she'd left, standing in her room, smelling her clothes, looking at her things, remembering her as he loved her, and fallen apart.  
  
He'd kissed another woman, yes, but she'd raped his soul. Now he wasn't innocent-not that he ever had been, but he wasn't calm, he wasn't placid, he wasn't whole anymore. And it should have made her want to walk away from him. At first she was happy, because she thought that maybe he wasn't the man she loved anymore. That because of her, because of her abandonment, maybe he had become someone different, maybe he had changed into a man who wouldn't save her.  
  
But she knew differently. He'd met her when she came, smiled at her, though his heart was not in it. He'd come to the city to give her flowers when she first sang, rescued her from the passion of others, and she had nothing to give him for it. A broken body, a mind that would not let her kiss him, a soul that wanted to float away.  
  
No, she still was not a perfect catch, she was not a Goddess in disguise, and yet he saved her, again and again.  
  
After Marie and Jubilee fell asleep, Kitty sorted through these things in her mind, and then she couldn't pretend to sleep anymore. She got up, pulled on her jeans, her sweater and her long wool coat, and walked down to the forest.  
  
There was this one bench where she liked to sit, old and wrought iron with blue wooden slats, black metal bindings, and a flower-bed on either side of it. There was a big weeping willow behind it, and when she felt like crying, she could go there, not shed a tear, just letting the willow cry for her. She liked that, because even though the bench was out of the way, if anyone came upon her, they would not know that she had been crying.  
  
In her black coat, and her blue jeans, she sat down on the bench, thinking about how she could get him back, maybe just as her friend, but back.  
  
Because she'd gone away so that when she was back, he would change, and she wouldn't love her anymore. But he had changed, lost his wildness, and gained a sweetness, and she'd come back only to fall more in love with him. This Scott wasn't domineering, he was sweet. This Scott wasn't in control, he followed orders. And this Scott wasn't just kind and generous; he was also a savior, her hero.  
  
Kitty crossed her legs and propped her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands. She closed her eyes twice, and then opened them.  
  
Apparently, the willow wouldn't weep for her this time. A tear escaped her eyes, and then another, before long, she was crying full on and gasping. Hiccups were not far behind when she started to breathe again.  
  
"Between you and me," She sang softly. "There's a basin of blood. There's a river of pain.between you and me." Her hands came in front of her chest in a moodra as she spread her legs into a Lotus. "Between you and me, boy, there's a lot of lies, a lot of pain, a lot to gain, between you and me." She was making it up as she went, and the eyes peeking through the forest didn't unnerve her because she didn't notice them.  
  
"Between you and me, there's a basin of blood, there's a river of pain, between you and me." She took a breath, and so did the eyes in the forest, and then she sped up. "You're my hero, cue the lights, you're my savior, cue the night, I don't see you, why should I? I don't understand you, I can't understand you."  
  
Kitty sang on, lamenting, until the figure stepped out of the forest. A gasp came to her lips, but never made it's way out. 


	21. Chapter TwentyOne

What I Want, Chapter Twenty-One.  
  
Somewhere, immersed in his dreams, he heard her screaming. The scream was long, and loud, and awoke him. But by the time he was truly awake, it had stopped echoing in his mind.  
  
It must have been a dream.  
  
The sun on the horizon though, was copper, and he knew that he had been asleep for hours. Scott stood up and began walking back to the mansion, back to the season, and back to the girl who would never love him.  
  
Walking back through the forest, he savored every moment. The trees would not judge him, the benches would not stare at him, the gravel could not love him, or hate him. It all just was. But as he looked around, as his eyes scanned his surroundings, there was something out of place. An earring, and he could swear that he'd seen it earlier today, on someone's ear.  
  
Not just someone's ear, though. Kitty's ear. He picked it up, and then walked further, his absent-minded Kitty-cat.  
  
But not his, not any longer.  
  
He sighed as he opened the door, and softly closed it behind him. He'd leave it on the doorstep of her room. She didn't want to see him, that much was obvious...and it'd be easier for both of them if they didn't see each other, especially knowing that he still wanted her, and she still hated him.  
  
Scott closed his eyes for just a moment, letting himself imagine that it was different, that she loved him, that he wasn't such a screw-up...that she really was his, would be his, forever.  
  
"Scotty-boy!" Chirped a hyper voice. "You seen the Kit-Kat?"  
  
"Jubilee.leave me to die in peace, please." He said, that usually got rid of her.  
  
"Well if you see her, tell her that Rogue and I wanna talkity-talk."  
  
"Okay." He said, wondering exactly why she would think that Kitty would talk to him anyhow. His eyes opened as Jubilee skipped away. "Wait!" He shouted after her. "You don't know where she is?"  
  
She grinned and winked at him, and then said: "Sure enough lover-boy..." And skipped away.  
  
He was sure Kitty had been with her last night. Certain...so now where was she? 


	22. Chatper TwentyTwo

What I Want, Chapter Twenty-Two  
  
She recognized him the moment he stepped out of the shaded leaves. At first he did not scare her, because he belonged, then he smiled, so cruel, his white teeth perfectly in line, his lips twitching, his eyes cold and dark and frightening. He did not belong anymore. But before she could speak, his right hand was over her mouth, his left hand grasping her arm, pulling her with him.  
  
She bit his hand, and then kicked back into his groin, she started to run, screaming, but he was faster, and she was tired...he had her in his grip again. "Je te voudrais." He whispered in her ear, and then suckled on her earlobe. "Tu ne le sais pas." His hands were around her neck before she could move, and then the scenes before her eyes went black.  
  
~ ~ ~  
  
When she awoke, she was in a room, hands behind her back and two eyes, flaming, watching her. She could hardly breathe, and he was moving.  
  
"Please don't hurt me." She said calmly. "I'll do whatever you want."  
  
"You will, eh?" He asked, and slid his hands behind her head. "Kiss me. Like you mean it." His eyes beckoned her, and she looked up, smiling enough for him to see. Memories replayed in her mind as she tried not to be repulsed, tried not to cry. Swiftly, his lips descended, her lips moved against his, though in her mind she was seeing another, touching another. Her hands were bound. She phased one through the rope, grabbed onto it and phased the other. Her lips moved like poetry, her fingers twisted and attempted to unknot the rope.  
  
"Ma belle." He said, his fingers slipping through her hair. "Mon amour." She tested the length of the rope. It would be enough. Her fingers found his neck, the rope slid along it's length, he was kissing her, he did not notice. She curled it's length around his neck and twisted.  
  
His eyes bulged as she pulled tighter, in her arms, he stopped struggling, fell against her. She pushed him away from her, tied his wrists together weakly, and phased through the door.  
  
He had forgotten about her "power," just as she had forgotten about it the first time she was cornered. But this time, she was centered, focused, and she made her way out.  
  
She was in his room. She wasn't positive, but fairly sure. She blinked as the light brought her back to reality.  
  
In his room, she was in his room and he had planned on raping her. She couldn't breathe, struggled to force the air in and out of her lungs, and then pushed his door open.  
  
The hallways was how it had always been, awry with students, screaming with madness. She leaned against the door and closed her eyes.  
  
She was shaking.  
  
"Kitty?" Asked a voice, she opened her eyes only to find that her hands covered them. Fingers came to pry at hers, arms wrapped around her, and she melted into them, clinging onto this strand of life, of sanity.  
  
She didn't even know who it was. "Rogue?" She asked, the tint to the fading reassurances was vaguely southern.  
  
"Kitty-kat, don't worry about it, calm down, come'ere." Kitty settled into the girl's form, sighed as the soft voice penetrated her shield, and wept, tears flowing, purging madness.  
  
"I need Scott." She said softly, and Marie's warmth pulled away from her. "Please." She said. "Please get him."  
  
Marie could not deny her, settled her against the opposite wall and shifted into the hall, walking calmly to find the man who she was sure had caused this pain. 


	23. Chapter TwentyThree

What I Want, Chapter Twenty-Three.  
  
"She's frantic." Marie said to him, her voice pleading. "Please Scott, she needs you."  
  
"I needed her, then.you think I don't know how that feels?" He said, and slammed shut the book he had been looking at. "Bring her here." He said. "Bring her here, and I will be here for her." His jaw was tight with his anger. "I am not going looking for her again."  
  
"Scott.Kitty is." She looked at him, his eyes were full of anger.  
  
"She has denied me more than enough times. I will not run to her again."  
  
"She's afraid." Marie said, and her hand reached out to touch him. "She needs you." Her eyes worried along the wall. "Scott, she didn't know when you were hurting. You know. She needs you."  
  
Pained, his eyes drifted to hers. "She can have me." He said, voice as soft as a whisper. "Tell me where she is."  
  
"Near Remy's room." She said, and he jolted up.  
  
"Why the fuck didn't you say that before?" He asked, and before she could answer, he had gone.  
  
~ ~ ~  
  
The black drifted around the edges of her vision, voices floated just above her conciousness. "Kitty." Screamed incessantly around her head just her name, over and over again. A finger flew across her cheek, her forehead beaded with sweat. "Kitty..."  
  
She opened her eyes. Weakly, her voice grew from her lips. "Scott?"  
  
His hands found her waist, his lips found her hair, he smiled against the flaxen locks, and reveled in the fact that she was real, there, wanting him, with him. He lifted her up, propped her against the door, and then lifted her in his arms.  
  
She was lighter than he remembered.  
  
He wanted to carry her to his room. Her room, the room she'd almost been raped in by the man who's room she had just been sitting near. He thought better of it and took it to her sterile guest room. He laid her limp form on the bed, and brushed her hair out of her eyes. Across the room, he sat down, and watched her.  
  
Fifteen minutes later, her eyes fluttered open. "Scott?" She asked weakly, and then more violently."Scott?"  
  
"I'm here." He said, and walked to kneel next to the bed. "What do you need?"  
  
"You." Her voice quivered. "I need you." Her hand reached out to search for his, and he pulled it away. She shuddered and turned from him. "Please, Scott?" There was terror in her voice, and just a little love. He clung to the love and climbed onto the bed with her, his legs splaying near hers, his left arm sprawling over her body. Her hands clung to his hand.  
  
"You're safe now." He said. "You're safe.Shhhhh." She calmed down, and under his fingertips, her heartbeat slowed. Her eyes fluttered to sleep, and she melted into his body.  
  
"Don't leave me." She said, and he smiled into her hair.  
  
If only this would last. 


	24. Chapter TwentyFour

What I Want, Chapter Twenty-Four.  
  
Late that afternoon, when she awoke to the harsh glare of the sunset on her face, though the sheer blinds, she lifted her arms to yawn, but they wouldn't move. She shifted to find another arm over her two.  
  
Her first though wasn't of panic or fear, but comfort. She knew that arm, those sinewy muscles and the light brown hair, she pulled him closer and sunk into his weight. If this was a dream, it would last for however long she could make it.  
  
"Kitty?" He asked, and her ears closed around the noise.  
  
"Scott." She said dreamily. "Stay here.at least until morning."  
  
"Morning's long past, Kitty." He said, and loosened his grip on her. "Now that you're awake, I should leave."  
  
"Please don't." She said, her voice hitching as she spoke again. "Scott, please don't leave me alone."  
  
"You'll be fine." He said. "I need to go."  
  
"Don't." She said again, and gripped his fingers in her own, "Please, I've been lying to you, about everything. You need to stay with me, just for tonight, if nothing else." He pulled away again. "I'll be anyone you want." Her voice betrayed her tears. "I'll do anything if you'll just stay."  
  
His hands found her stomach and rode up on it, sliding up over her stomach and her ribcage, the undersides of her breasts and over them, cupping them. "I want you to tell me the truth." He said, and then turned her towards him, his hands skimming to the small of her back, and his lips finding her throat. "Tell me what I want you to do."  
  
"I don't know." She said, and slipped her fingers between his, she brought his fingers back to her breasts and smiled weakly. "I want you to touch me." She said. "I need to know I'm still real to someone."  
  
"You've always been real to me." Scott said, slipping his hands away from her breasts. "I love you." He said against her ear. "Now what do you think I want you to do?"  
  
"Love you." She said. "Scott.I love you.I." His hands found her hips, and she twitched into him. She wrapped her arms around him and moved her lips against his throat. "Be with me." She said softly. "Please, just stay with me."  
  
As his head lifted to see her eyes, to know that it was true, Scott smiled, and her calm lips met his bowed ones, and they kissed and kissed and kissed forever. 


End file.
